138 



Garden and Forest. 



[March 19, 1890. 



Prokessor Kellerman, in The Industrialist, quotes ap- 

 provingly what was said in our issue of January 22d of the 

 ornamental value of the Celtis or Hackberry, as it is usually 

 called in the west, and he adds that in Kansas it has a 

 greater relative value than in well-timbered regions, where 

 so many kinds of trees grow in perfection. In the state, 

 which includes a large portion of what was once known 

 as the "Great American Desert," the Hackberry is one of 

 the few trees which can withstand the drought, hot winds 

 and other trying characteristics of that variable climate. 

 Professor Kellerman, however, calls attention to the fact 

 that the annual report of the Kansas College Experiment 

 Station for 1888 gave a full account of an insect — a species 

 of Phytopus — and of its invariably accompanying fungus 

 (SpJicerotheca phytoplophila, Kell. & Sw.), which are 

 doing great injury to the Celtis in that region. The insect 

 is a gall-mite and the fungus a species of powdery mildew, 

 and they cause what is known as "Hackberry knot," an 

 abnormal growth which seriously injures the health and 

 appearance of the tree. The disease is said to occur in the 

 eastern part of Kansas, and it extends westward as far as 

 the forest-trees extend. It is also reported in Iowa. Pro- 

 fessor Kellerman has not found the trees in the forest 

 abundantly attacked, but most of the isolated ones are dis- 

 figured by the multiplying knots until they become very 

 unsightly and finally die. No remedy has been experi- 

 mentally determined upon except cutting off and burning 

 the infected parts. 



A figure of one of these knots is given in The Industrial- 

 ist, and we refer to it because we have recently observed 

 a similar appearance on many specimens of the Celtis in 

 Central Park, in this city. A more careful investigation will 

 be needed to identify this disease with the western one, but 

 it is not improbable that trees of this species throughout the 

 country have found a serious enemy. 



Japanese Dwarf Plants at Paris. 



IT is well known that the Japanese landscape-gardener 

 prides himself on his treatment of areas so small that we 

 should give them up to a gravel walk and a couple of Gera- 

 nium beds. So it was a disappointment not to find, on the 

 soil of the Japanese Horticultural Section in the Exhibition 

 grounds at Paris, some illustration of his practice. 



The Japanese Horticultural Section was only a small space 

 on a rather steep part of the Trocadero slope, surrounded by 

 a rough bamboo fence which would doubtless have looked 

 pretty amid consonant surroundings, but seemed a little 

 slovenly and poor by contrast with neighboring French 

 arrangements, which were scrupulously trim and durable 

 looking. Almost the whole of the enclosed space was laid 

 out in a series of low terraces, each of which bore a row of 

 potted plants. 



I was not wise enough to know whether any of these 

 plants had especial interest for the European botanist. But I 

 soon saw that some of them were extremely interesting to the 

 cultivator and the student of art. These were the examples 

 of dwarfed trees. We have become familiar, in our own gar- 

 dens, with certain dwarf varieties of trees produced in Japan, 

 as with many kinds of little Maples ; but I speak especially 

 of dwarfed specimens of individuals which, if left to them- 

 selves, would have been large, but which generations of gar- 

 deners had patiently restricted to the most exiguous propor- 

 tions. These we constantly see in Japanese pictures, but 

 there is seldom a chance to behold them alive. 



In the Bulletin de la Societe Botanique de la France some 

 facts were recently given with regard to the method of their 

 production, on the authority of two Japanese connoisseurs, 

 one of whom was an exhibitor in Paris. The chief point is 

 that the trees are grown in the smallest possible quantity of 

 soil. The baby plants are put in pots so small that their.roots 

 soon fill them entirely, and, seeking further nourishment, break 

 out above the surface. Then a somewhat larger pot is given, 

 in which, however, the same want of sufficient nourishment 

 soon produces the same result; and this treatment is per- 

 petually continued. Moreover, only just so much water is 

 supplied as is absolutely needful to preserve life. The main 

 root thus becomes bent and the lateral roots develop neither 

 quickly enough nor profusely enough for vigorous growth, 

 and all the processes of life are very greatly retarded. The 



roots are never cut off, and through their gradual elevation 

 the whole plant is sometimes raised on what looks like a sys- 

 tem of aerial roots. 



Again, the twigs are early bent, so that they cross one 

 another, or the stem, in abrupt or zigzag ways, Bamboo-fibres 

 being used to bind them temporarily in place. Thus all 

 growth which does take place is kept within dwarf dimensions, 

 so that the stem, after fifty or one hundred years of life, is 

 often but from an inch and a half to three inches in diameter 

 and about ten times as high. If a bent twig dies it is cut off, 

 and the new one which springs from below it is forced to take 

 its place. This sometimes produces the look of a graft. Fre- 

 quently a piece of Fern-stem or a bit of tufa or coral is so 

 placed that the main stem bends around it. If all the twisted 

 branches die, new ones are then grafted on the old stock. 

 Conifers bear this sort of treatment much better than dico- 

 tyledonous plants, as the tendency of these to throw out side 

 shoots can tire the patience even of Japanese gardeners. For 

 no detail of free growth out of harmony with the forms of the 

 main branches can be allowed. Every smallest twig must 

 scrupulously accommodate itself to the general effect. Thu- 

 yopsis dolobrata, Chamacyparis obtusa, Pinus parviflora and 

 P. densifolia are among the conifers most commonly chosen 

 for dwarfing. Some of those exhibited in Paris were nearly 

 1 50 years old, and were valued at hundreds of dollars. They 

 tempted the purse of many observers, but I doubt whether any 

 one was rash enough to buy, for it was plain that their value 

 depended on a continuance of the Japanese cultivator's skill — 

 they might as well die at once as live to lose their character 

 through unregulated growth. 



What now was the artistic interest of these specimens ? 

 Sometimes it was merely the charm that lies in anything 

 quaint, bizarre, grotesque. But often we saw forms so beau- 

 tiful in their way and so clearly illustrative of one phase of 

 Japanese artistic endeavor that it was a pure delight to study 

 them. Often these little trees were not bizarre and patently 

 deformed, but as fine in their outlines, as grand in their 

 masses, as imposing in their effect, as suggestive of ideas of 

 long existence and vigorous development, as could be the 

 most mighty specimen seen out-of-doors. It needed a little 

 effort to put one's self at the right point of view. But it soon 

 was easy to look at them as the Japanese himself must look — 

 to consider them as miniature representations which the eye 

 knew to be small, but the imagination accepted as large — that 

 is, it was soon easy to look at them as we look at little pictures 

 or at statuettes. If a reproduction of a large form on canvas 

 can satisfy eye and mind, although it measures but a few 

 inches itself, why cannot one be likewise accepted when 

 wrought in the same material as the original ? Here was a 

 portrait, so to say, of a great Thuyopsis or Pine, which, in a 

 pot scarce twelve inches across, we could have perpetually at 

 hand not merely to suggest, but actually to show, the beauty 

 of its original. Here in portable shape we had form, color, 

 substance, movement, odor — everything but size; and when 

 we had learned how to look we missed size even less than in 

 one of Barye's tigers or in a miniature of a familiar face. -The 

 best of these little trees were not mere curiosities, but true 

 works of art. If simply kept small they would have been the 

 former ; but kept small and looking gigantic, they were artis- 

 tic in intention and result. Of course such an effect could be 

 produced only by the twisting processes employed. Mere re- 

 tardation of development would not answer. If we could keep 

 a six-year-old White Pine forever of the same size and shape 

 it would never look like a century-old one. It must be forced 

 to take a shape characteristic of maturity. Nor does it matter, 

 I think, whether or not the shape achieved is precisely that of 

 a freely-developed individual of the same species. So long as 

 the dwarfed tree looks as though a freely-grown large one 

 might have assumed this shape, the artistic ideal is achieved. 



But still more interesting than these isolated dwarfs were 

 certain arrangements where a number had been grown to- 

 gether. Several creations of this sort had been brought to 

 Paris, but so far as I saw, only one remained in perfect condi- 

 tion. This was exhibited in August at one of the flower shows 

 in the great tent, and may have been noticed there even by 

 visitors who did not penetrate the Japanese section. It con- 

 sisted of a board about as big as a tea-tray with a raised rim 

 around the back and sides. At the right hand back corner 

 was a thick irregular group of conifers, some eighteen inches 

 in height, massed around a large stone. So carefully had the 

 shape of this stone been chosen and the shape and arrange- 

 ment of the plants been studied that the effect was precisely 

 the same as though we saw a great precipitous rock sur- 

 rounded by graceful yet imposing trees of natural size. A 

 lower mass of foliage formed the centre of the background, 



